Road food

I have a pricey burger at the Big Sur Bakery & Restaurant. Its staff and recipes are showcased in "The Big Sur Bakery Cookbook: A Year in the Life of a Restaurant," written by owners Michelle Wojtowicz, Philip Wojtowicz and Michael Gilson.

Topped with white Vermont cheddar, grilled onions and slices of heirloom tomato, the sandwich looks good on the plate and tastes fine. The beef is a little overcooked, though, unfortunately.

I have a much less expensive burger at Burger Me, a casual place opened by Mark Estee on Donner Pass Road in the small town of Truckee, near Lake Tahoe. Nobody at the restaurant has published any kind of a cookbook, as far as I know.

They use meat, I learn, from Five Dot Ranch, a family-owned business in the Napa Valley. The beef is 100-percent natural, raised without antibiotics or hormones. And, it is cooked exactly the way I like it, medium-well.

(The photo is of Burger Me!)